With Embargo Easing, Haiti Appears Heading To Normalcy

February 16, 1992|By GARRY PIERRE-PIERRE, Staff Writer

In less than a month, factories in Haiti will be abuzz with workers as a result of the United States` declaration that it is willing to ease an economic embargo and allow raw materials into the country.

Many experts said that easing, along with the repatriation of refugees from Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, signals a return to normalcy in the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere.

Outraged by a Sept. 30 coup that booted popularly elected President Jean- Bertrand Aristide from power, the international community, led by the Organization of American States, placed the embargo on Haiti.

The embargo was designed to bring the army-backed government and the elite who supported the coup to their knees and restore Aristide.

There are many who argued that the embargo was not effective. There was a chronic shortage of gasoline during the early stages of the embargo, but the shelves of stores throughout the country remained well stocked. Gasoline now is readily available at filling stations.

With no vital U.S. interest at stake, there has been no lobbying campaign by President Bush or high-level officials to press Europeans to adopt tough sanctions.

The result was a blow to Haiti`s economy strong enough to inflict widespread suffering among the masses but too weak to hurt the anti-Aristide elite who were the target.

The Association of Haitian Industrialists said at least 100,000 -- and perhaps as many as 150,000 -- jobs were lost. Most were in clothing and electronics assembly plants, which have been unable to import from or export to the United States since the trade embargo took effect on Dec. 5.

``The way I see it, the United States will slowly relax the embargo and then, after a couple of months, everything will be removed without much fanfare,`` a Haitian businessman said last week.

The businessman, who wanted to remain anonymous, said if raw materials are allowed in, then gasoline and other products also will be imported to run the factories at full capacity.

But the easing of the embargo may be complicated if reports of human rights abuses of repatriated Haitians can be proved. If that happens, the Bush administration may have no choice but to restore the embargo.

The State Department said it had no evidence of reprisals against the refugees returned, but human rights workers said such reprisals could easily go unreported.

``Repression does not happen at the port where foreign journalists are watching the refugees arrive; it happens at the village level,`` a spokesman for the Roman Catholic Church group Justice and Peace said.

So far, the only reports of reprisals are in the transcripts of interviews U.N. officials have conducted with a group of refugees who fled Haiti for a second time after being returned by the U.S. government. They are now in the internment camp at the U.S. Navy Base at Guantanamo Bay.

The refugees said that soldiers beat and killed members of a group of 538 boat people taken home in November before a U.S. federal judge temporarily banned repatriations.

In the early stages after the coup, the army waged a campaign of terror and intimidation to keep Aristide supporters from taking to the streets. As many as 1,500 were killed, human rights sources such as Amenesty International said.

But now the army is more entrenched in power and does not have any reason to kill repatriated Haitians. Their immediate concern is to have the international community lift the embargo.

``The government wants to remain in the good graces of the United States. I don`t think they will do anything to jeopardize the precarious relationship they have now,`` the businessman said.